Raw
by singyourheartout287
Summary: Reaction fic to 6x01/02. Blaine turns into an insomniac after the breakup, keeping himself awake at night thinking over every detail of his and Kurt's relationship, and everything he did wrong and everything he could have done better, and all the ways he could have made Kurt stay until finally his parents push him to go to a therapist for help. One-shot.


Numb.

That was Blaine's only emotion for the first month after their break up. Total and complete numbness. He'd shut down, unable to handle all of the negative emotions and unanswered questions swirling around in his mind. If he opened that door, if he let himself feel, all hell would break loose.

He hadn't moved out of their loft right away, mostly because he had no place to go and he didn't have the energy to start looking for his own apartment. If he did that, all of it would be real, and he didn't want it to be real. He slept on the couch every night and he and Kurt moved around the loft with their heads down, eyes glued to the floor, pretending the other didn't exist. It was painful, but Blaine knew it would've been more painful if they'd spoken. If they'd made small talk, or planned meals together, or acted like everything was normal when it felt like Blaine's entire life had come undone.

Again.

This was worse than the first time, though. The first time they broke up, it made sense. Blaine cheated. He was dirty, and untrustworthy, and broken. He ruined what they had and there was no other choice but to break up. This time, though, Blaine was in the dark. He had no idea what he'd done wrong-but it must've been something he'd done or else why would Kurt have looked at him with such disdain, such anger, such _hatred _at that restaurant. Kurt had looked at him like he was the biggest inconvenience in the world, like he had no idea why he'd ever agreed to marry Blaine in the first place.

When Blaine got kicked out of NYADA, hell did break loose. He didn't leave the couch at all for a week other than to go to the bathroom. He didn't eat, he didn't shower, he didn't go out or get dressed. He spent every day and every night drifting in and out of sleep, reluctant to stay conscious and face what his life had become. And then his parents came, they said Kurt had called them and told them that Blaine needed help, and that is when Blaine knew that Kurt really and truly hated him. He hated him so much that he called Blaine's parents to get him out of the loft. And if Kurt wanted him gone that much, then fine, Blaine would go. He let his parents pack his things and got in their car with them and left without a word to Kurt, even though Kurt was sitting on his bed the whole time.

Blaine's old room felt familiar, but not in a good way. His four walls held memories piled to the ceiling of his relationship with Kurt, and it hurt to much to look at them, so Blaine stayed in the guest bedroom and insisted his parents take every remnant of Kurt out of his room before he went back in. They did, and when Blaine went back to his room two nights later, it was blank. No picture frames, no tickets or mementos of outings, no gifted stuffed animals or bow ties. The only thing his parents missed were the journals, and the pressed flowers in between the pages of them.

It wasn't his parents' fault they didn't take the journals; they didn't know. To any outside observer, they looked like two, black, leather-bound journals for any use. But inside, Blaine had charted his entire relationship with Kurt. Every page was filled with Blaine's neat cursive, pouring his heart out to Kurt. He had planned to give them to Kurt as a wedding present, so Kurt could go through and read them and truly understand as they started their life together how much Blaine loved him-how much Blaine had always loved him.

Blaine sat on his bed and flipped through them, mesmerized by his own writing and the memories they brought with them. The beginning was happy, so happy, and Blaine couldn't bear to read those. He skimmed until he got to the most painful part-their first break up. On one page, Blaine had sat down and written out everything he did wrong that caused them to break up. At the top of the list in big, bold letters was _I CHEATED. _Below that were eight more bullet points, little things that Blaine knew had gotten on Kurt's nerves and drove him away.

A knock on the door made Blaine jump and he slammed the journal shut, slipping both of them under his pillow. His mom poked her head through the door. "Everything okay?"

Blaine nodded. "Fine."

"Honey, I know you're hurting right now, but-"

"Mom. _Please._"

She paused, then nodded her head. "Okay. Are you hungry at all? You look thin."

"No."

"You should eat something, Blaine."

"If it wasn't optional then why did you ask?"

She hesitated by the doorway for a moment before stepping back and closing the door, heels clicking on the hardwood floor as she walked away.

Exhausted, Blaine crawled up the bed and laid down, pulling the duvet over him. He tried to sleep, but ended up staring at the wall for hours, crying intermittently. His mom came in and brought him a sandwich, setting it on his bedside table without a word. Blaine poked it and grimaced. The thought of food made his stomach roll, so he turned over and stared at the other wall. It was nearing two in the morning when he started crying harder than he'd let himself since the break up. He rolled over and grabbed his other pillow to clutch onto and muffle his sobs when he noticed the journals he'd shoved under there.

He threw them against the wall, curled up with the pillow, and cried until his throat felt raw. He sat up to drink some water from the bottle by his bed and stared down at the journals on the floor.

Their first break up made sense, and Blaine had his journals to prove it. But this time, Blaine had no idea what he'd done. He crawled across the bed and stood up, stretching his sore muscles, then picked up the journals. Grabbing a pen from his bedside table, Blaine went over to his desk and sat down, opening the second journal to a blank page near the back. At the top, he wrote the date in the right corner, then printed as a title for the entry, _BREAK UP #2. _He tapped his pen against the paper and tried to come up with reasons they'd broken up. The first thing that came to mind was the thing Kurt had mentioned at the restaurant-the toothpaste. So Blaine made a neat _#1 _and wrote next to it, _too anal. _Then he laughed humorlessly to himself and scratched it out, writing _too nit-picky _instead. He thought over his relationship with Kurt, trying to think of more things to add that would have contributed to their break up. He stayed up scrawling in his notebook until five in the morning, when he couldn't keep his eyes open anymore. He'd written down twenty-three things so far, and he figured that was good enough so far, so he closed the journal and went back to his bed, falling into it and taking a nap.

The next day he ate a bowl of soup at his mother's insistence and came downstairs to watch football at his dad's insistence. Blaine didn't care much about any of it, but he indulged his parents so they'd be more willing to leave him alone when he slipped back upstairs. He watched three games with his dad before standing up from the couch.

"Where are you going?" his dad asked.

"I'm tired. I didn't sleep much last night," Blaine said.

His dad paused, rubbed a hand down his face and scratched his short, neatly-trimmed beard. "Alright."

Blaine nodded and headed back upstairs, laying down on his bed. He picked a random DVD from his collection and put it into his laptop, setting it down beside him on the bed. It was more for background noise-he didn't even keep his eyes open to watch it-but it helped. It was better than the deafening silence he'd had to deal with for the past two months. He slipped in and out of sleep as the movie played, and then the DVD menu rolled on repeat; he didn't bother putting a new movie in because he liked the music on the DVD menu.

After a while, his mom came in to tell him goodnight. Blaine glanced at his clock and realized it was nearing midnight. When she left, Blaine went back to his desk and started on his list again. There were more things, he was sure of it. There had to be. He ran his hands through his hair and tugged hard, then thought of something and wrote it down.

_#27: too much hair gel_

It went like that for the next few nights. Blaine couldn't sleep-consumed with thoughts of his relationship with Kurt and every little thing he could've done wrong. The time he left the cap off the toothpaste, the time he yelled at Kurt for doing the same thing, the time he burnt the pasta, the time he showed up late to their dinner reservation and they lost it so they had to eat at a crappy diner down the block, the time he accidentally hit Kurt in the face while he was sleeping and his nail scratched Kurt's nose, the time he forgot to get carrots at the store on the way home when Kurt had specifically asked him to several times throughout the day. There was a myriad of things that could've been it, could've been the breaking point for Kurt, and the tricky part was that Blaine didn't know which it was. So he had to write down everything he could think of, starting with the most recent and going backwards chronologically. There were so many things Blaine had done wrong, so many ways he could've been better.

Four nights and 103 reasons later, he reached their first break up, the time when he cheated. He wrote that down in big bold letters. Then, it didn't feel like enough, so he wrote it again. A glance at the clock told him it was almost three in the morning. He wiped a hand down his face and stared down at the paper, at the two bold, underlined bullet points screaming up at him _I CHEATED,_and it was like a light bulb. It finally made sense. All of the little things, all of the other 103 reasons he'd already written down, they only mattered because Blaine cheated. Everything he did after that was wrong because he'd already made the biggest mistake of his life. Because he was a _dirty. whore. cheater. _He wrote it down in his notebook, underlining each word over and over again until his pen ripped through the paper. He didn't realize he'd started crying until he saw the water droplets on his paper and his vision started to blur. And then it was like a dam broke, and he couldn't stop; he cried and cried and wrote over and over again _I cheated I cheated I cheated I cheated. _

When he ran out of paper and breath, he pushed the journal away and forced himself to take deep breaths. His heart was hammering in his throat and his face, neck, and collar of his shirt were soaked. Blaine stood up and fell onto his bed, curling up in a ball and holding on tight to his comfort pillow.

He didn't know he'd fallen asleep until he was shaken awake. He blinked up at his mom and frowned. "What?"

She licked her lips and looked like she was going to cry. "You need to get up."

"Why?"

"I'm taking you somewhere today."

Blaine groaned and pulled the pillow over his head. "I don't want to go anywhere."

"It's not a choice, Blaine Devon. Get up."

"Where? Where are you taking me?"

"To Dr. Chase."

"Who's Dr. Chase?"

"Your new therapist."

Blaine pulled the pillow off his head and gawked at his mom. "What?"

"You need to talk to someone, honey," she said, sitting on the edge of his bed. "And it's obviously not going to be me or your father. Cooper says you've been avoiding his phone calls."

"I...don't know where my phone is."

She sighed and ran a hand through his hair. He pulled away and her mouth turned down. "Blaine, I know this is hard. Breaking up with someone is difficult, and as much as you liked Kurt-"

"Love, Mom. Not like. He's not a schoolboy crush. He's the love of my life. He's everything."

She sighed again and pursed her lips. "Your father and I are worried about you. And this morning, I found this." She held up Blaine's journal.

Blaine sat up and reached to snatch it out of her hand, but she held it out of his reach. "Give it back. You had no right to read that."

"I'm your mother. I have every right. Blaine, this kind of obsessive thinking isn't healthy. You are not the only one to blame for the way things happened, and if you're not going to listen to me or talk to me about it, you have to talk to someone. You've holed yourself up in this room and isolated yourself; you're not eating, I don't think you're sleeping, you're not moving or talking to anyone. I read online that these are all signs of depression, and-"

Blaine scoffed and snatched his journal back. "I'm surprised you were able to get to Google."

She paused. "That was mean, Blaine."

Blaine took a deep breath and shook his head, guilt weighing heavily on him. "I know. I'm sorry. I just..."

"You need someone to talk to," his mother said quietly, placing a hand on his knee. "I read that if a parent lets their child suffer through this kind of thing alone, they could lose them. I know you and I haven't always gotten along well; I know you resent me for a lot of things; but I love you, and I won't let you slip away."

Blaine sat there for a minute, clutching onto his journal and staring down at it. He flipped through it, eyes catching on the last several pages where all he'd written was _I cheated. _Maybe it was wishful thinking, but maybe the reason things didn't work out the second time was because they hadn't fully healed from their first break up, from the cheating. They'd brushed it under the rug and moved on because they were both so eager to start their future in New York together, but it festered like an open wound and made everything even more painful now. And if Blaine was ever going to have hope for something with Kurt in the future, he had to work out everything from their past. From his past.

He stood up and went over to his dresser, pulling out a pair of simple jeans and a plain purple polo. "I'm not gelling my hair," he said.

"That's fine," his mom said. She stood up too and headed for the door. "Be ready in fifteen minutes."

"Yes, ma'am."

Blaine put on his clothes and stood in front of the mirror. He didn't recognize himself at all, and not just because he hadn't gelled his hair. There was a look in his eyes that he'd never seen before, and it hurt so much he had to look away. He picked up the journals from his bed and his desk and dropped them into his satchel, taking it along. Blaine was nothing if not dedicated, and if he was going to do therapy, he was going to do it right.

... ... ...

_A year and a few months later..._

"...I swear to god, it's true. Sam went on a date with Spencer."

Kurt shook his head and clutched his stomach, eyes watering from laughter. "_Stop. _That's _illegal._"

"I know! He had no idea Spencer was hitting on him! This whole time Sam thought he was just being accepting and friendly, but he was flirting."

"_How_? I mean, how did he not know? He's been friends with you for years, for god's sake. How does he not know how to be friends with gay men?"

"This is a gay boy, Kurt. Spencer is very much still a minor."

Kurt laughed harder and shook his head. "Okay stop, stop. I can't breathe."

Blaine laughed and gave Kurt a minute to calm down before getting his keys out and unlocking the front door. They stepped into his house together and Kurt took a deep breath, looking around.

"It still looks the same," he said quietly.

"Mom's done some re-decorating, actually. The carpeting in the living room is different and she bought a whole new dining room table set. Want to see?"

"Maybe later," Kurt said.

Blaine smiled. "Alright. This way, then," he said, going upstairs.

"I know the way to your room, Blaine," Kurt said.

"Right."

They entered his room and Blaine tensed at Kurt's sharp intake of breath. "Wow."

Blaine shrank, sitting on the edge of his bed and hunching his shoulders. "I know."

"Everything is different."

"I know."

"You got new carpet, and painted the walls, and a new bed set and dresser and-Where is everything?"

"It's here."

"No, I mean..._our _everything."

Blaine nodded and walked over to the closet, taking out two large boxes and setting them on the floor. "It's here. After everything, I just...I couldn't look at it. I needed it gone. So my parents packed it up for me and put it in the hall closet. I brought the boxes here recently, but haven't unpacked them and put everything back yet."

"Why not?"

"I just don't want to jinx anything, that's all."

Kurt smiled, small but genuine. "I like the new wall color. This muted teal looks great."

"Thank you."

Kurt crouched down by the boxes and placed his hands on them, looking up at Blaine. "May I?"

Blaine nodded and paced around the room, anxiety kicking in. He thought about taking one of his pills, but he hadn't gotten around to telling Kurt about them yet and he didn't want to open that discussion at the moment. Not when everything was so fragile. Kurt's breathing was steady for a while, so Blaine knew everything was safe. There were only pictures in there, after all. Some tickets and playbills from shows they'd gone to see, gifts Kurt had given him, bow ties he'd worn on special dates they'd gone on.

When Kurt's breathing turned ragged, Blaine figured Kurt had found the picture Blaine snapped of Kurt sleeping after they'd had sex. He was lying on his stomach, sheet draped low on his back, exposing the planes and muscles beautifully. Blaine couldn't resist; he'd taken a picture and printed it out, keeping it just for himself, to remind himself how lucky he was to have a man so otherworldly beautiful.

"Blaine, what is this?"

"Oh, that's just..." he turned around to see Kurt holding a journal.

_Fuck._

Blaine raced over and ripped it out of Kurt's hands, slamming it shut. "It's nothing. I...forgot it was in there."

"But what is it?"

"A journal. It's personal. Don't worry about it."

"It has my name all over it."

"So does _The Sound of Music _but that doesn't mean you wrote it."

Kurt frowned and stood up. "What was that at the end? Who's a dirty whore cheater?"

Blaine flinched hearing those words come out of Kurt's mouth. He clutched the journal tightly to his chest and looked down, tears brimming.

"_Oh." _Kurt came over and wrapped his arms around Blaine, holding tightly. "_Blaine._"

Blaine cried against Kurt's shoulder, the journal a burning barrier between them. "I'm so sorry."

"For what? You didn't do anything wrong."

"I did everything wrong. That's what the journal is for. Or, what it turned into."

Kurt pulled back to look at Blaine but kept his hands on Blaine's biceps. "I don't understand."

"I used to have these journals that I used to write all about our relationship in. They were supposed to be a good thing that I'd show to you on our...wedding day. But then, after everything, it kind of turned into...a list."

"A list of what?"

"Everything that I did wrong that led to our break up. I didn't understand what had happened or why, so this was my way of trying to make sense of everything."

"But it didn't have anything to do with you. It was all me."

"I know that now, but at the time... I didn't know what to think."

Kurt frowned and swiped his thumb across Blaine's cheekbones, wiping away his tears. "I'm sorry I ever made you think that way. I know I messed up a lot, but I'm trying to fix it now."

"I know. I am too." Blaine paused and pulled away, staring down at his journal. "Do you think we'll ever find a way to make this work? Or are we just going to be sucked into this...on and off thing for the rest of our lives?"

"I wouldn't let that happen to us, Blaine. It's too painful. But I think...I think given enough time, we're going to figure out how to make this work. We just have to keep trying. But I know that when we get back together, it'll be the last time. No more break ups, no more heartache. It'll be 'til death do us part, or we can't do it at all."

Blaine's stomach swooped at Kurt's word choice. _When _they got back together-not if. It was no longer a possibility, but an inevitability.

Blaine flipped through the journal, heart aching over all those nights he'd wrote and wrote and cried until he was raw with pain. The agonizing time he'd spent obsessing over it, going over every little fight again and again searching for some new clue, some hidden meaning. Dr. Chase had helped him realize that there was nothing new to be found-things were the way they were and no matter how many times Blaine went over it in his head, it wouldn't change things. He couldn't change what happened, or the way things ended, or the pain it caused him. But he could choose how to handle it, how to take that pain and grow from it and learn-to learn from his mistakes and start new.

He and Kurt were in a good place again, _finally, _and it wasn't because of anything Blaine had done in the past. It was because of the way he decided to handle their future.

"I love you," Blaine said, because in that moment, there was nothing else for him to say.

Kurt smiled and took the journal from his hands, dropping it back into the box and taking Blaine back into his arms, no barriers. "I love you too."


End file.
